New York art turns Bulgarian village into outdoor gallery

STARO ZHELEZARE, Bulgaria (Reuters) - With fewer than 500 inhabitants, Staro Zhelezare in southern Bulgaria is a world away from the mean streets of Manhattan, but its houses and barns have now been painted with some of the most famous images from New York’s Museum of Modern Art (MoMA).

A local villager looks at murals on the wall of a house in the village of Staro Zhelezare, Bulgaria, August 4, 2018. REUTERS/Stoyan Nenov

Andy Warhol’s banana, Salvador Dali’s clocks and Edvard Munch’s “The Scream” are among the murals that have turned the village into a spectacular open-air gallery in what is becoming an annual event.

It is the fourth year that students from Poland have painted the walls of Staro Zhelezare, a project launched by Polish woman Katarzyna Piriankov and her Bulgarian-born husband Ventzislav who decided the theme this time should be the New York gallery.

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“We always want to make our projects on the basis of contrast and absurdity, connecting them with special places,” said Piriankov, from the Polish city of Poznan.

“So, we decided to invite New York to Staro Zhelezare and its people. They also deserve to see the beauty of MoMA’s art works.”

As well as the locals, foreign visitors have come to see the street art.

“It is just amazing,” said Englishman Nigel Thompson. “I’ve never imagined something like that, you can even see Marcel Duchamp’s bicycle wheel.”